


All Aboard the USS Honeymoon

by Skyler10



Series: Expats in Florida [2]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Cruise Ships, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Honeymoon, Humor, Romance, Smut, talks of parenthood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-01
Updated: 2016-07-01
Packaged: 2018-07-19 10:56:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7358431
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skyler10/pseuds/Skyler10
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John and Rose spend their honeymoon on a cruise ship while Donna keeps their dogs. Unfortunately, in their year and a few months together, they’ve managed to avoid a serious, life-changing fight: who wants kids and who doesn’t. All is forgiven, however, when things get romantic and passionate later that night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Salty Dogs

**Author's Note:**

> This is for both TPP’s FIVE ficlet prompts and for the DWSmutfest's “Did you just?” prompt, though I’m not sure if that last one counts since that part is in chapter 2 and the smut is in chapter 4 (feel free to skip to ch. 4 if you’re only here for smut). Ch. 1-3 are light teen for innuendo. 
> 
> Also, this is the sequel to Summer Jobs and Beach Dogs, so I recommend reading that first. But then, I’m the author, so I’m biased.

“You know what the problem with having two dogs is?” Rose called from the tiny bathroom.

“Shedding? Barking? Bags of dog food the size of this cruise ship?” John guessed as he flipped through the cruiseline’s newsletter.

“No.” Rose stepped out into their cabin where he could see her. “They chew things.”

She turned around slowly, and John burst into laughter when he saw the tattered hole exposing her bum through her bikini.

“Now that is an entirely different meaning to honey moon.” He winked, and she raised an eyebrow and placed her hands on her hips.

“You thought that was really clever, didn’t you?”

“Yep.”

“Got it out of your system?” She crossed her arms and gave him a “look” but he barreled on anyway.

“Hey, look,” he pointed behind her. “It’s a rearview mirror! Get it, Rose?” He waggled his eyebrows as she threw up her hands in defeat. She set about digging out her other bikini from her luggage.

“That was awful, you know.” She smiled anyway as he snuck up behind her and wrapped his arms around her bare stomach. He pressed kisses to her temple and along her neck, making her giggle. “I thought we were gonna go to the pool today. And you wanted to sit out on the deck with a drink you didn’t have to make, remember?”

“Hmm, I do remember that, but see, my wife showed off her excellent arse and now my priorities have changed.” As he spoke, she felt the rumble of his voice shoot sparks of arousal through her body. She melted back against him for a moment.

“No, later,” she protested with all her willpower. “You’re going to regret not going out now when all the good deck chairs are taken later. We’ll probably end up in the Splash Zone or something.”

“What’s that?” he asked, highly distracted by nibbling at a new love bite where her neck met her shoulder.

“The kids area,” she reminded him with a raised eyebrow he didn’t catch.

He groaned, but pulled away. She turned around and danced the little (undamaged) bikini in front of his face before disappearing back in the bathroom.

 


	2. Rough Seas Ahead

As luck would have it, they were already too late. They snagged the last two remaining side-by-side deck chairs on the entire ship… at the Splash Zone.

An American woman in a black one-piece and white coverup shouted at two kids running around the perimeter of the pool.

“If you two don’t stop it right now, there will be no dessert tonight, you hear me?”

The kids exchanged mischievous grins but stopped. Satisfied, the woman turned to the newlyweds.

“So, which ones are yours?” She smiled in that knowing way parents share when among their own kind.

“Oh, no, we don’t…” John stuttered, trying to explain why it wasn’t creepy that they were hanging out by the kids pool with no kids.

“We’re on our honeymoon,” Rose explained. “Got a bit of a late start this morning and these were the only ones left open. Hope you don’t mind. You weren’t saving these for anyone?”

“Oh, of course not!” The woman laughed and winked at John. “I remember those kind of mornings. Be careful. That’s how you end up with these.” She gestured to her kids, splashing each other with vengeance.

“Noted,” John grimaced and stood. “I’m off to the deck below for drinks. Rose?”

“Just a water, love. Ta.”

John headed down the staircase directly behind them just as the American mother introduced Rose to her offspring. He was silently grateful he had gotten out of that just in time.

On his way back, he heard their conversation before they were aware of his return.

“Goodness, here I am, talking about us this whole time,” the woman was saying. “And what about y’all? Do you think y’all will have kids soon or wait a bit?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Rose mused. “Maybe wait a few years. We’ve only been together a little over a year. And that was pretty much from the day we met. So it’d be nice to have some time to ourselves before we start a family, you know?”

The woman laughed. “Oh, do I ever know. Yes! Enjoy it. But this part is pretty great too, just so you know.”

Still hidden in the stairwell, John swallowed and realized the condensation from the cold glasses in his hands was starting to drip on his feet.

“Hello, ladies!” he greeted a bit over-enthusiastically. “Hope I didn’t miss anything riveting.”

“Not at all, I was just--” the woman stopped midsentence as she caught sight of her kids slapping each other in a playful way that was starting to become serious. “HEY! What did I tell you?!”

Rose took the opportunity to quietly remark to her husband, “You were gone a while.”

“Was I?” he quipped back. She searched his all-too-innocent expression.

“And there’s something we’re going to talk about later,” she informed him. “I don’t know what yet. But I can see it’s there and this isn’t the place for it.”

“If you say so!” He shrugged and tried a little harder to act normal.

 

* * *

 

A few hours later, back in their cabin, they were in their first argument as a married couple over… well, something that went a lot deeper than what excursion to pick for the next day in port.

“I’m sorry,” Rose said, sounding more sarcastic than apologetic. “Did you just say you don’t want to do Option 2 because it involves an hour on a bus and there _might_ be families on board?”

“That’s not what I’m saying, but yeah, what if there is some kid screaming for an hour? Not so relaxing is it?” He pointed his finger at her, which her hand promptly captured and lowered.

“John. We both want to do these activities on _this_ list. You can’t seriously tell me you want to do Option 1 or 3.”

“No…” he protested weakly, searching for a legitimate reason for why he was even picking this fight with her.

“So what? Yeah, there might be loud people. We’ll deal with it.” She said it as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. And she was right. Therefore, he had to dig himself in deeper.

“Not just people. _Children_. You can’t control children. They just--”

“Actually, I can,” she interrupted him. “I’m a teacher, remember? I do it every day. And I don’t have to here. Their parents are going to be with them and the assistant cruise director who controls _them_. So, I’ll ask you again. What’s wrong with Option 2?”

They just stared at each other for a second while she waited for him to come back with something, anything.

“John,” she sighed after a while. “What’s this really about?”

He scrubbed his hands over his face and sank onto the pristine white bed.

“I overheard you talking to that American woman earlier.”

“At the kiddie pool?”

“Yeah.” He inhaled and drove right into it. “Rose… Did you just tell a stranger we were having kids? Without, I don’t know, talking to your husband about it first?”

“What? That’s what this is about?” Rose threw down the brochure on the table. “And no, I didn’t tell her we were having kids…”

“Yet. You said not yet.”

“Well, we aren’t! Unless you know something I don’t?”

“Rose,” his voice softened and he patted the space on the bed beside him. “Sit down. We need to talk about this and you pacing isn’t going to help.”

“I’m not pacing!”

“Sit. Please,” he begged.

She joined him as requested, but as she did, all the fight drained out of her.

“Ohmygod,” she murmured and paled. “You don’t want kids. No, more than that. You _really_ don’t want kids. Blimey. I’m so blind. Or stupid. You’ve always said, and I…”

“No, you could never be stupid. I’m sorry,” he offered with a shrug. “I just don’t… Rose, I’ve never had a family like that. Besides Donna and Wilf, I’ve never really had _anyone_ until you.”

“I guess growing up in boarding schools doesn’t really lead to a fatherly instinct,” she sympathized, but still looked sick. “We don’t have to, of course. Just thought maybe someday… But it doesn’t matter to me, really. It’s not a big thing.”

John ran his hand through his hair as he observed her. She was putting on a brave face now, he could tell.

“It is a big thing,” he countered. “A huge thing. Possibly the biggest thing.”

She met his eye with uncertainty about where he was going with this.

“Yeah, it is,” she surrendered with a small voice.

“Rose, be honest with me. Do you want kids?”

“Not if you don’t.” Her teeth played with her bottom lip.

“Before, earlier by the pool, did you want kids then?” he pressed.

Rose swallowed and diverted her attention to the port hole, watching the water go by.

“I think about it sometimes at work,” she admitted. “Teaching the resort kids to paint. I just wonder what it would be like. What ours would be like. It’s silly, I know.”

“Hey,” he took her hands in his own. “It’s not silly. Thank you for being honest with me, even when you already knew what I thought.”  

“What if…” She was so quiet, he wasn’t sure she had spoken. She tried again, head hanging so she was talking to her lap. “What if we accidentally…”

“Rose. You know I’m not going anywhere. If something like that happened, I’d be the best dad I could be. I’d… I don’t know.” He blew out a deep breath. “I’d figure it out. Because I love you.”

“But you wouldn’t want it.” A single big teardrop landed on the back of his hand, which was still covering hers. She pulled away and wiped at her red eyes. “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m being like this. I don’t really even want one either. Of course not. Terrible fate for an artist. I’d never get anything done.”

She blinked back the moisture in her eyes and sat up straighter. Her closed lips smiled, trying to prove her sincerity to him. He loved her for her strength, even as it broke his heart.

“I’d want it.” He met her surprise with sincerity.

“What?”

“If it happened. Accidentally. I’d want it.”

Her forced smile faded into something more moved, touched by his simple words, even though they didn’t change his earlier statement.

A tune over the intercom speaker interrupted their moment.

“Ladies and gentlemen of dining group A, this is your ten-minute notice until your designated seating time in the Coral Ballroom.”

John kissed her cheek and dropped her hands. They continued to get ready, remembering that this discussion was all hypothetical anyway and, after all, they were on their honeymoon.


	3. Fireworks on the Starboard Side

After dinner, Rose and John put their formal wear to good use on the upper deck. The stars shone overhead as romantic music played to an open dancefloor that covered the ship’s largest pool.

“This one goes out to all the couples out there,” the DJ announced. “First, if you’ve been together more than 40 years?”

A few couples in their 60s moved to the dance floor. Everyone clapped in congratulations.

“30 years? 20 years? 10?” the DJ continued as couples filled the space in front of him. “5 years? Any first anniversaries out there?”

A couple raised their hands and let out a drunken “Here!” as they joined the growing mass of slow-dancers. There was still room for one more group, however.

“Where are my honeymooners?” the DJ called. John took Rose’s drink from her hand and set it down on the nearest table. He tugged her out into the open area of the deck and pulled her close. Her arms settled on his shoulders, fingers caressing the hair at the base of his neck.

“May I have this dance?” John murmured into her ear and nuzzled her hair.

“Little late to refuse,” she teased.

“We were called to duty; what choice did we have?”

Rose just hummed and wrapped her arms around him tighter, laying her head on his chest as they swayed to the slow, gentle music.

Eventually, the song ended and couples around them headed to the open bar, or to their cabins, or waited for the next dance. A few even stayed where they were, kissing until the DJ returned to the mic.

“Stick around for a few more minutes, folks. We’ve got a show for you, followed by the last dance of the night.”

A loud BOOM sounded from a barge off the starboard side. Ooohs and ahhhs resounded throughout the crowd as colors exploded into light above them. Rose jumped at the surprise and clung to John’s dinner jacket. He smiled and slid his arm around her back to rest his hand on her hip. She sighed and leaned into him as the rockets sparkled and spread into wide streaks of ruby, gold, emerald, and indigo.

Emotion caught in his throat as he watched above them, then down to the wonder playing out across his bride’s face. He could see the fireworks reflected in her eyes.

“Thank you,” he said into her ear.

She turned to face him as the last crackle faded into wispy smoke and floated off into the night sky.

“For the dance?” Her lips turned up in amusement he assumed was at his expense.

“For everything. For marrying me.” He slipped his hands around her lower back as he leaned in so only she could hear. “For loving me even though I’m… this.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Define _this_. Because _this_ ,” she gestured to all of him, “is pretty wonderful, from where I’m standing.”

He sighed and looked up to the sky before answering.

“A workaholic academic. A divorcee who has no idea what he’s doing as a husband. An orphan who can’t be a dad because he doesn’t know how.” John couldn’t meet her eye now as the list of confessions came out. He realized the music for the last dance of the night had started up again and that they were swaying in time to it. Her hands circled under his arms to curl over his shoulders and hold him close while still being able to see his face.

“Hey,” she soothed. “Stop being so hard on yourself. That’s my favorite person you’re talking about there.”

He didn’t smile back yet, but the glimmer in her eyes compelled him to kiss her soundly.

“You know what else?” she asked rhetorically when they parted. “There’s something you forgot. We’re in this together. You know what you said earlier, about if we happen to get pregnant by accident? How you’ll figure out to be a dad if you have to? See that’s just the thing: we’re _all_ just figuring it out as we go along. You think I know anything about being a wife? Raised by a single mum, remember?”

He nodded, but kept his mouth shut, absorbing her much-needed perspective. She continued.

“Besides, no matter what happens, I love you. And if it’s just us forever, I’m happy with that. Honestly. And if, someday, we become parents… we’ll figure it out together and give it our best and that will be enough. That’s all any mum or dad can promise. But we’d already be able to give our kid more than either of us had. Because we have each other. And _you’re_ all I really want.”

“As I was saying,” John replied with a hint of a smile, “thank you. For everything. There are no words for how much I love you.”

She kissed him in response. He reciprocated so thoroughly that couples around them exchanged knowing looks and whispered about how that must be one of the honeymoon couples and how oh yes, they had been seen as one of the last couples on the dancefloor just before the fireworks.

“Ready to head in for the night?” he asked, brushing her fallen curls back behind her ear.

Rose hummed in content agreement. “Ready for an entirely different sort of dancing, _that’s_ what I’m ready for.”

“Oh really?” He lifted an intrigued eyebrow as she slapped him lightly on the arm. “Because that can certainly fit into our itinerary.”

“Have this all scheduled out, do you?”

“Nah, I’m not that kind of cruise director. More the spontaneous sort.” His wink sent shivers down her spine, but it didn’t keep her from a comeback of her own.

“More like the pulling it out of your arse sort.”

“Language, Rose! This is a family friendly ship!” His faux shock made her laugh.

“Shut it and take me to bed, _Doctor_.”  She used his nickname she had coined and that their friends called him.

“Gladly, my dear.”

She laughed and grabbed his hand. Giggling like teenagers, they dashed back to their cabin.


	4. Sail Away

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is where the explicit rating comes in. :)

Once inside, their fun and the earlier gravity of their conversations fell away to the dominance of passion. They would have plenty more arguments and discussions about their future, revelations of their wounds, and opportunities to help each other heal. But not tonight. Tonight was about simply relishing every inch of each other’s skin.

She only had time to remove her makeup and jewelry before he had her backed against the floor-length mirror on the wall. Lips slid between lips. Hands smoothed over a sparkling, short red dress, over her bum and down the skirt that had glittered so brilliantly when she had spun on the dancefloor that evening. Now though, it was being bypassed as his fingers crept up to peel off her black stockings.

John knelt in front of her, pressing hot kisses to bare legs as he rolled the thin fabric down to reveal her to his touch. She slipped off her heels and the stockings, and he removed his shoes and socks. Instead of standing, as she had predicted he would, he walked his fingers back up under her skirt to the sexy lingerie she had waiting for him to see. He wiggled his middle finger between the knickers and her thigh, pressing up until he reached her wet center.

“More, please more,” she whimpered as he traced a light fingertip through her slippery folds, right where she wanted him.

Contrary to her wishes, he repositioned his fingers to stroke her through the dampening fabric. He teased her clit with the lace, making her knees shake. His other hand had been “adjusting” his growing bulge, but now, it came up to steady her hip against the mirror.

“No.” She tugged at his wrists. He furrowed his brow, certain that she had been enjoying that. “Bed, please. We need… bed.”

Pleased she was so far gone, further than he’d thought, he stood with a proud smirk and snogged her breathless.

“Not what I asked for, but I’ll take it,” she quipped when they separated for air. She resumed their snog with an added grinding on his thigh. Her naughty hand slipped between them to trace his erection through his dress trousers.

It was his turn to moan.

“What did I want?” she teased with a breathy tone.

“Mmm bed. You said bed.” He closed his eyes and tilted his head back as she stroked all the way up to his belt buckle and began to undress him.

“And where are we?” She lowered his zipper, slow but steady.

“Not bed,” he answered with a hiss. Her hand found his pants, silky navy ones he assumed were the closest male equivalent to lingerie he owned. It _was_ their honeymoon, after all. He had to at least try for “sexy.”

He apparently had succeeded despite his science geekish lack of sexy nightwear fashion knowledge.

Rose walked him backwards to the bed, stopping only to let him kick off his falling trousers and to remove his jacket, black tie, and shirt layers. Undershirt tossed to the side, she kissed him and ran her fingers through the soft patch of hair right in the center of his chest. It briefly registered that she was pushing him backwards as he eased himself onto the bed without letting go of her hip, intending to pull her down with him. She wriggled out of his grasp and stood before his admiring gaze. She made quite the show of freeing her hair from its updo, letting the golden curls fall and shaking it loose to bounce over her shoulders. She gathered it to the side and turned her back to him.

“Unzip me?” she asked with those all-too-innocent doe eyes glancing over her shoulder. She worried her bottom lip, now swollen and red from all their snogging.

John scrambled up to assist her, repeating his previous kissing down her body as more skin was revealed. When he reached the end, he placed a final kiss to the curve of her lower back, just above her bum. She let the fabric fall, and bent down to add the dress to their growing pile of formal clothing. He unashamedly oogled her bum, which he was sure had been the intent of her positioning.

She turned to face him as she straightened. Despite having been together a year, and having seen her in lingerie on many occasions before, she took his breath away. Seeing her in this little black and cream lace number sent his pulse racing. He couldn’t help but run a hand over the front of his bulging boxer-briefs. She caught him, but instead of saying anything, she smirked and ran her own hands over her body, starting with her bra, down to her sides, over her flat stomach, to her hips and thighs and up again to flip through her hair.   

He had no idea where she learned such a move, but he didn’t care. He wanted her. Now.

Luckily, she felt the same.

“These are lovely,” he complimented, twisting his fingers around the waistband of her knickers. “But they are in the way.”

“What about this?” she asked, hands cupping her bra. She bit her lip in that playful way she did and reached around to the catch, knowing perfectly well he would want to prove his prowess by doing it himself.

Sure enough, he batted her hands away and unlatched the bra before making quick work of tugging the knickers down her legs. She discarded both as he shimmied out of his boxer-briefs.

Clothing out of the way, she resumed pressing him back on the bed, so she could climb on top and straddle him. She settled on his thighs, stroking him into full hardness in front of her. She took the liberty of humping his erection against her clit and through her folds. It felt so fucking good. She moaned his name. He was gripping the sheets with one hand and her upper thigh with the other.  

“Rose, please, love.” As much as she enjoyed his begging, she was so ready for him as well. She lifted up and slid down on his cock. They both gasped at the sensation of his filling her with so little fingering foreplay earlier to stretch her opening. He was significantly thick and long, just the right size to stretch her pleasurably, but usually they fooled around a bit more. However, she adjusted quickly to the sensation of him inside her from a year of practice.

She began rocking against him, which he vocally agreed with as a brilliant plan. Increasing in speed, she added a little up and down thrusting, which he gladly met with his own. One of his hands came up to massage her breast, then teasing her nipples until they were hard, erect, flaming pink buds. He leaned up to lick at them, which caused her rhythm to stutter. He relented, relaxing back. She stopped him, however, with a hand to his chest.

“Come back, please,” she breathed. “Up here.”

He sat up and she scooted herself forward on his lap, drawing his cock even farther inside her. She wrapped her arms under his so her fingers could dig into his back over his shoulderblades. She rocked against him again before resuming their original rhythm.

“Ohhhhhhh, fuck,” she called loudly.

“Shhh, love,” he chuckled through his own pleasure. “Thin walls.”

She whimpered but bit down on her lip in acknowledgement of his reminder.

“Right there, mhhhh yes,” she whispered in his ear instead. Sweet revenge was the name of the game as he felt her tighten her inner muscles around his cock.

“Mmmm, like this?” he asked, thrusting his hips forward and into her. She nodded against his shoulder. The metaphorical lightbulb went off in his head. “I’m hitting your clit, aren’t I?”

She responded with a whimpering moan as he thrust up harder.

“Rose?” he teased, speeding up his rhythm. “I asked you a question. Is that good?”

“Yeah… yes!”

“Yes, what?” He began a new love bite as she rode him.

“Yes! Yes, so good. Yes, that’s my clit. Yes, yes… yes, John, yes!” she called in time with their intimate movements.

“Rose… Rose, you feel so fucking fantastic. So wet, so gorgeous, so…uhn… so…”

“Oh, shut up and fuck me,” she panted into his shoulder.

He obliged, flipping them so her back hit the mattress. He didn’t lose pace, however. She wrapped her legs around him and moved her hips in time with his as he took her fast and hard.

“Rose, love, I’m gonna…” he warned. “Please. Close?”

“Yeah, oh yeah, right there, so close,” she assured him. Just for good measure, he rolled his hips in a way he knew would hit her right where she needed it.

Despite his warning about thin walls, they both came moaning each other’s names with white-hot pleasure sparking between them and radiating out through their bodies, wrapped up completely in their lover’s embrace. She tugged him down on top of her for a minute as his shaky arms gave out. They floated in the cocktail of afterglow and honeymoon bliss until he began to soften within her. Both of them grimaced as he pulled out, their combined fluids seeping out of her. He retrieved a flannel and cleaned them both before settling back into bed with her.

She cuddled up to his side under the covers, satiated and sleepy. She pressed a kiss to his chest and he traced light circles over her bare back. They had quickly discovered back home in the Florida heat that sleeping naked or nearly naked allowed them to stay close despite their combined body heat and it quickly became their favorite way of ending a night of passionate intimacy.

“I love making love to you,” he murmured into the top of her head.

“You too,” she mumbled against his skin, already half-asleep. “Forever.”

A glint caught his eye and he realized that the hand she had rested over his heart was the one with her wedding rings, the only thing she was wearing. This sent a thrill through said heart, and something deliciously possessive caused him to hold her a little tighter tonight. This precious, stunning, compassionate, brilliant young woman loved him unconditionally. And she was his entire universe.

That night he dreamt a dream he had never dared to before: a pregnant Rose laughing in joy as their child moved within her. The scene changed and a tiny fist wrapped around his thumb. It changed again and a miniature version of his beloved peered up at him. For the first time, in his imagination as he slept, pride and happiness overshadowed the lifelong deep ache he carried within. Perhaps it was all a mirage, a fantasy of what he wished it would be like instead of the harsh reality, but as he remembered flashes of the dream the next morning while Rose slept in his arms, he decided that he would risk it all for love of her.

 Regardless of what their future held or the size of their family, as she had pledged under the stars, they would weather it together. As husband and wife.


End file.
